Who made the clock?

Question

Who made the clock?

Answer 1

There are various opinions about the first civilization to have measured time. Some say the Hindus, some say the Greeks, some say the Egyptians, etc.

It is known that more than 7000 years ago, the Hindus (Aryan Civilization) used to gaze at the sky and measure the time by looking at the position of stars, the sun, etc. This let them understand time and they used it for various activities like religion, astronomy, astrology, etc. In fact Vedic Astrology is solely dependent on time of birth, which was calculated without any mechanical devices.

The Egyptians were known to have used the water clock. This device could measure a certain amount of time dependent upon the amount of water that moved through a port. They were also the first people to have made a calendar consisting of 365 days.

The Persians and Sumerians made the hourglass, where time was measured by the amount of sand transferred from one chamber of the device to the other. In spite of the name, it in not necessary that the device measured a time of an hour. There were also hourglasses that measured time of a minute, a minute and half, etc.

Similar to the Hindus and Egyptians were the Chinese who measured time in various ways like the direction of wind, etc. But the Chinese were surprised to see the clock, which was brought to China for the first time by European explorers.

Europeans were the first to make a mechanical clock similar to the ones we use today.

Answer 2

go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clock

Answer 3

The clock is one of the oldest human inventions, meeting the need to consistently measure intervals of time shorter than the natural units, the day, the lunar month, and the year. Such measurement requires devices. Devices operating on several different physical processes have been used over the millennia, culminating in the clocks of today.

Answer 4

like the mechanical one? because time in general and keeping track of it was the egyptians, or some say the greeks

Answer 5

A clock is an instrument for measuring, indicating and maintaining the time. The word clock is derived ultimately (via Dutch, Northern French, and Medieval Latin) from the Celtic words clagan and clocca meaning "bell". For horologists and other specialists the term clock continues to mean exclusively a device with a striking mechanism for announcing intervals of time acoustically, by ringing a bell, a set of chimes, or a gong.[citation needed] A silent instrument lacking such a mechanism has traditionally been known as a timepiece.[1] In general usage today, however, a "clock" refers to any device for measuring and displaying the time which, unlike a watch, is not worn on the person.

Clock at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich

Clock at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich

Contents

[hide]

    * 1 History

          o 1.1 Sundials and other devices

          o 1.2 Water clocks

          o 1.3 Early clocks

                + 1.3.1 A new mechanism

                + 1.3.2 Early astronomical clocks

          o 1.4 Later developments

    * 2 How clocks work

          o 2.1 Power source

          o 2.2 Oscillator

                + 2.2.1 Synchronized or slave clocks

          o 2.3 Controller

          o 2.4 Counter chain

          o 2.5 Indicator

    * 3 Types

          o 3.1 Time display methods

                + 3.1.1 Analogue clocks

                + 3.1.2 Digital clocks

                + 3.1.3 Auditory clocks

    * 4 Purposes

          o 4.1 Ideal clocks

          o 4.2 Navigation

    * 5 Seismology

    * 6 Specific types of clocks

    * 7 See also

    * 8 Notes

    * 9 References

    * 10 External links

[edit] History

    Further information: History of timekeeping devices

Replica of an ancient Chinese incense clock

Replica of an ancient Chinese incense clock

The clock is one of the oldest human inventions, meeting the need to consistently measure intervals of time shorter than the natural units, the day, the lunar month, and the year. Such measurement requires devices. Devices operating on several different physical processes have been used over the millennia, culminating in the clocks of today.

[edit] Sundials and other devices

The sundial, which measures the time of day by the direction of shadows cast by the sun, was widely used in ancient times. A well-designed sundial can measure local solar time with reasonable accuracy, and sundials continued to be used to monitor the performance of clocks until the modern era. However, its practical limitations - it requires the sun to shine and does not work at all during the night - encouraged the use of other techniques for measuring time.

Candle clocks and sticks of incense that burn down at, approximately, predictable speeds have also been used to estimate the passing of time. In an hourglass, fine sand pours through a tiny hole at a constant rate and indicates a predetermined passage of an arbitrary period of time.

[edit] Water clocks

    Main article: Water clock

A scale model of Su Song's Astronomical Clock Tower, built in 11th century Kaifeng, China. It was driven by a large waterwheel, chain drive, and escapement mechanism.

A scale model of Su Song's Astronomical Clock Tower, built in 11th century Kaifeng, China. It was driven by a large waterwheel, chain drive, and escapement mechanism.

Water clocks, also known as clepsydrae(sg: clepsydra), along with the sundials, are possibly the oldest time-measuring instruments, with the only exceptions being the vertical gnomon and the day-counting tally stick.[2] Given their great antiquity, where and when they first existed are not known and perhaps unknowable. The bowl-shaped outflow is the simplest form of a water clock and is known to have existed in Babylon and in Egypt around the 16th century BC. Other regions of the world, including India and China, also have early evidence of water clocks, but the earliest dates are less certain. Some authors, however, write about water clocks appearing as early as 4000 BC in these regions of the world.[3]

The Greek and Roman civilizations are credited for initially advancing water clock design to include complex gearing, which was connected to fanciful automata and also resulted in improved accuracy. These advances were passed on through Byzantium and Islamic times, eventually making their way to Europe. Independently, the Chinese developed their own advanced water clocks, passing their ideas on to Korea and Japan.

Some water clock designs were developed independently and some knowledge was transferred through the spread of trade. It is important to point out that the need for the common person to 'know what time it is' largely did not exist until the Industrial Revolution, when it became important to keep track of hours worked. In the earliest of times, however, the purpose for using a water clock was for astronomical and astrological reasons. These early water clocks were calibrated with a sundial. Through the centuries, water clocks were used for timing lawyer's speeches during a trial, labors of prostitutes, night watches of guards, sermons and Masses in church, to name only a few. While never reaching the level of accuracy based on today's standards of timekeeping, the water clock was the most accurate and commonly used timekeeping device for millennia, until it was replaced by the more accurate pendulum clock in 17th century Europe.

[edit] Early clocks

In 797 (or possibly 801), the Abbasid caliph of Baghdad, Harun al-Rashid, presented Janae with an Asian Elephant named Abul-Abbas together with a "particularly elaborate example" of a water [4] clock.

None of the first clocks survived from 13th century Europe, but various mentions in church records reveal some of the early history of the clock.

Medieval religious institutions required clocks to measure and indicate the passing of time because, for many centuries, daily prayer and work schedules had to be strictly regulated. This was done by various types of time-telling and recording devices, such as water clocks, sundials and marked candles, probably used in combination. Important times and durations were broadcast by bells, rung either by hand or by some mechanical device such as a falling weight or rotating beater.

The word horologia (from the Greek ὡρα, hour, and λεγειν, to tell) was used to describe all these devices, but the use of this word (still used in several romance languages) for all timekeepers conceals from us the true nature of the mechanisms. For example, there is a record that in 1176 Sens Cathedral installed a ‘horologe’ but the mechanism used is unknown. According to Jocelin of Brakelond, in 1198 during a fire at the abbey of St Edmundsbury (now Bury St Edmunds), the monks 'ran to the clock' to fetch water, indicating that their water clock had a reservoir large enough to help extinguish the occasional fire [5].

These early clocks may not have used hands or dials, but “told” the time with audible signals.

[edit] A new mechanism

The word clock (from the Latin word clocca, "bell"), which gradually supersedes "horologe", suggests that it was the sound of bells which also characterized the prototype mechanical clocks that appeared during the 13th century in Europe.

Between 1280 and 1320, there is an increase in the number of references to clocks and horologes in church records, and this probably indicates that a new type of clock mechanism had been devised. Existing clock mechanisms that used water power were being adapted to take their driving power from falling weights. This power was controlled by some form of oscillating mechanism, probably derived from existing bell-ringing or alarm devices. This controlled release of power - the escapement - marks the beginning of the true mechanical clock.

Outside of Europe, the escapement mechanism had been known and used in medieval China, as the Song Dynasty horologist and engineer Su Song (1020 - 1101) incorporated it into his astronomical clock-tower of Kaifeng in 1088[6]. However, his astronomical clock and rotating armillary sphere still relied on the use of flowing water (ie. hydraulics), while European clockworks of the following centuries shed this old habit for a more efficient driving power of weights, in addition to the escapement mechanism.

The first mechanical clocks to be driven by weights and gears were invented by medieval Muslim engineers.[7][8] The first geared mechanical clock was invented by the 11th-century Arab engineer Ibn Khalaf al-Muradi in Islamic Spain; the first weight-driven mechanical clocks, employing a mercury escapement mechanism and a clock face similar to an astrolabe dial, were also invented by Muslim engineers in the 11th century. A similar weight-driven mechanical clock later appeared in a Spanish language work compiled from earlier Arabic sources for Alfonso X in 1277.[9] The knowledge of weight-driven mechanical clocks produced by Muslim engineers in Spain was transmitted to other parts of Europe through Latin translations of Arabic and Spanish texts on Muslim mechanical technology.[10]

An elephant clock in a manuscript by Al-Jazari (1206 AD) from The Book of Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices.

An elephant clock in a manuscript by Al-Jazari (1206 AD) from The Book of Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices. [11]

In the 13th century, clock construction and engineering entered a new phase with the advancements made by Al-Jazari, a Muslim engineer from Diyar-Bakr in South East Turkey, who is thought to be behind the birth to the concept of automatic machines[citation needed]. While working for Artuqid king of Diyar-Bakr, Nasir al-Din, al-Jazari made numerous clocks of all shapes and sizes. In 1206 he was ordered by the king to document his inventions leading to the publication of an outstanding book on engineering calle

Answer 6

The Egyptians had water clocks--and they were probably around along time before that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clock

Answer 7

A clock is an instrument for measuring, indicating and maintaining the time. The word clock is derived ultimately (via Dutch, Northern French, and Medieval Latin) from the Celtic words clagan and clocca meaning "bell". For horologists and other specialists the term clock continues to mean exclusively a device with a striking mechanism for announcing intervals of time acoustically, by ringing a bell, a set of chimes, or a gong. A silent instrument lacking such a mechanism has traditionally been known as a timepiece. In general usage today, however, a "clock" refers to any device for measuring and displaying the time which, unlike a watch, is not worn on the person.

Answer 8

the guy in england

Answer 9

Jost Burigi

more about him at:

http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/...

Answer 10

This should provide you all information, you want to know about time measurement:

http://physics.nist.gov/GenInt/Time/time...

Answer 11

Father Time?